Industry, Logistics & Shipping

Roads will be free of traffic jam, accidents soon: Tesla CEO

Roads will be populated with self-driving automobiles, eliminating traffic jams in as few as five years and there will be no more traffic accidents, predicted Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla.

Speaking on the future of transportation, specifically the impending arrival of autonomous cars, at the World Government Summit in Dubai, Musk said that although driverless cars will be a “great convenience,” it will result in 12 per cent to 15 per cent job loss.

“We need to find new roles for those people as increased manufacturing of autonomous cars will be very disruptive and very quick,” he said.

Musk also sounded a cautionary note to governments as technology continues to improve efficiency, saying a “universal basic income” will be necessary as there will be “fewer jobs that a robot cannot do better.”

In an earlier conversation on “The Future of Mobility”, Travis Kalanick, CEO and co-founder of Uber, predicted Uber will continue to evolve. “We will partner with the car industry. We want cars to be available everywhere every time efficient, quick, reliable, affordable, and fully democratised. Push a button and go where you want to go.”

Last month, Uber announced a partnership with Daimler to manufacture autonomous cars.

His three-year vision is ambitious: “Uber is at the beginning of becoming a robotics company,” Kalanick commented. “Once movement in cities becomes autonomous, there will be all sorts of interesting robotics challenges.”

Prior to the session with Musk, Mattar Al Tayer, chairman of the Roads and Transport Authority, announced that human carrying drones are expected to be introduced into service within the public transport system by July 2017. -TradeArabia News Service